Carlie Machell-Kay, NCPS

Carlie Machell-Kay is a psychodynamic counsellor who supports people facing stress, anxiety, relationship difficulties, trauma and abuse, and the challenges of living with health conditions. She also helps with parenting concerns, grief, addiction, low self-esteem and coping with major life changes. Carlie uses a calm, approachable style and works to make sessions feel practical and straightforward.

She qualified as a therapist seven years ago and brings seven years of practice as a counsellor together with over two decades of wider experience supporting others. That background includes work in women's mental wellbeing services and domestic abuse settings. Carlie draws on what she has seen in those roles to shape how she responds to clients.

Carlie describes psychodynamic counselling as a way to look at how past relationships affect current thoughts and feelings. She also offers trauma-focused approaches to address the impact of difficult events. Narrative therapy is used when it helps clients tell and reframe their stories in more helpful ways.

In the therapy room she aims to tailor sessions to each person. She says sessions are friendly and approachable, and that goals and pacing are set together. Carlie also notes personal experience with neurodiversity and brain injury, which informs her empathy for people affected by those issues and for their families.

She holds NCPS as a listed credential and works from the United Kingdom. Sessions are carried out in English and she is open to working with international clients through the service.

Approaches that can shape online sessions

Carlie uses psychodynamic and trauma-focused ideas alongside narrative work to help people process difficult material. Psychodynamic counselling looks at how past relationships influence current feelings and behaviour, which can help with long-standing patterns and relationship issues. Trauma-focused therapy centres on the impacts of distressing events and aims to reduce their hold on daily life by working through the emotional and practical effects. Narrative therapy helps people tell, organise and, when helpful, reframe their personal stories so they feel less stuck.

Choosing the right approach is part of the work. Carlie treats this as a collaborative process and will talk through goals, preferences and the options that best fit a person’s situation. She adjusts methods and pacing together with each client rather than using a fixed formula.

Session formats are not specified in the original profile, so please confirm the available online options before booking. Online work can make it easier to fit therapy around a busy life, reduce travel, allow shorter check-ins when needed and offer flexible scheduling across time zones for international clients. These practical benefits can help people sustain therapy alongside medical care, caregiving and other daily demands.